Friday, November 23, 2012

Where private affairs have public consequences

(First published in the Nelson Mail and Manawatu Standard, November 21.)

Certain aspects of the American character puzzle me.

Their ardent patriotism is one. It’s on display everywhere,
from “God Bless America” bumper stickers to the Stars and Stripes that flutter
from houses in virtually every street.

Another is their intense religiosity. No one from New
Zealand – a country so irreligious that some Christians are almost embarrassed to admit
they go to church – can fail to notice the fervent faith of many Americans.

It’s especially noticeable in the more conservative states,
where on Sundays it’s common to see acres of cars parked outside large,
imposing churches, even in sparsely populated rural areas.

That brings me to another curious aspect of the American
character. Public morality is an infinitely more sensitive issue there than in New
Zealand.

That was obvious from the political furore that blew up over
the revelation that the military hero General David Petraeus, who commanded US
forces in Iraq and Afghanistan, had conducted an affair with a much younger
woman who wrote his biography. The scandal ended his brief career as head of
the CIA.

Paula Broadwell had spent much of last year “embedded” with
American troops in Afghanistan as she gathered material for her book. In this
context that term, which is usually applied to journalists reporting the war, took
on a whole new meaning.

As often happens with political scandals, one disclosure led
to another. The Petraeus scandal soon enveloped other people – notably
socialite twin sisters from Florida who had a penchant for cultivating
politicians and senior military figures.

One of the sisters, Jill Kelley, complained to an FBI agent that
she was receiving threatening emails – supposedly from Broadwell, who appeared
to suspect Kelley of making a play for Petraeus. Another four-star general,
John Allen, was then exposed as having exchanged suggestive emails with Kelley.

Are you managing to keep up so far? If not, never mind.
Because the interesting point is that in America, private affairs often have
public consequences.

In Italy and France, it’s generally assumed that prominent
men will have extra-marital liaisons. In fact it’s almost expected of them, as
if you’re less of a man if you don’t have a mistress tucked away somewhere.

Though the Brits tend to be more discreet, the British
public too has generally been tolerant of infidelity in high places. Mild-mannered
former prime minister John Major’s reputation didn’t seem to be seriously
harmed – in fact may even have been enhanced – by the revelation that he had
carried on a four-year affair with backbench MP Edwina Currie.

David Lloyd George, leader of Britain’s coalition government
in the latter years of World War I, was nicknamed the goat on account of his
womanising (he was also, by all accounts, prodigiously endowed), and King
Edward VII had a string of high-profile mistresses.

In Britain, things seem to get messy only when there are
national security implications, as when Defence Minister John Profumo was
famously sacked for having a relationship with call-girl Christine Keeler, who
was simultaneously sleeping with a Soviet spy.

Closer to home, Australian prime minister Bob Hawke had a
reputation as a philanderer. Like Petraeus, Hawke had a relationship with his
biographer (the exotically named Blanche d’Alpuget). The Aussie media knew of
Hawke’s infidelities – the relationship with d’Alpuget was public knowledge –
but it was never a hot political issue.

Closer still, New Zealand journalists have tended to turn a
blind eye to politicians’ affairs, even when they were relatively common
knowledge (as in the case of the late Robert Muldoon, who was once the subject
of a wickedly witty fake newspaper billboard that read Rooting pig shot in Ngaio; PM safe). The general view was that it was
none of the public’s business unless the relationship compromised the
participants politically, implicated them in illegality (as in the case of two Labour
MPs who were outed for homosexual activity before it was decriminalised) or
reflected poorly on their ability to do their job.

An exception was National MP (and later Speaker of the
House) Doug Kidd, whose affair with a parliamentary secretary was exposed by
the feminist lobby in 1983 with the express purpose of causing him political
embarrassment. The feminists were gunning for Mr Kidd (as he was then – he was
later knighted) because he had moved to amend the abortion law.

Otherwise, the only recent sex scandals I can recall in New
Zealand politics were those that came to public attention because they were the
subject of police complaints. The politicians involved – National’s Richard
Worth and Labour’s Darren Hughes – both resigned.

The big difference in America is that even when an
adulterous relationship has been between consenting adults and there has been
no suggestion of criminality, the code of public morality often demands that
the transgressor be punished.

For a long time, a respectful American press left presidents
alone. Franklin D Roosevelt had mistresses, one of whom was even assigned a
code name by the Secret Service. Dwight D Eisenhower’s relationship with his English
female chauffeur during World War II was never referred to while he was alive.
John F Kennedy scattered his seed with impunity, knowing he was protected by the
sanctity of his office.

All that changed post-Watergate, when the US media began applying
much more critical scrutiny to politicians.Two high-flying casualties were senators Gary Hart in the 1980s and John
Edwards in 2008 – both contenders for the Democratic Party’s presidential
nomination who became soiled political goods when their extra-marital
activities were made public.

Even in business, careers have been destroyed by affairs –
as in the case of Lockheed Martin president Chris Kubasik, who was forced to
step aside because of his relationship with a subordinate.

President Bill Clinton is a remarkable exception to the rule.
Miraculously, perhaps due to personal charisma, America seems to have forgiven
him his indiscretions with Monica Lewinsky (and Gennifer Flowers, and Paula
Jones, and probably others that we don’t know about).

Adultery and politics are natural bedmates, if you’ll pardon
the metaphor. The personal characteristics that make men successful in politics
– ambition, charisma, energy – are often the same as those that make them
sexually adventurous and attractive to women.

No doubt that’s true of many military commanders too. And
it’s hard not to feel sympathy for General Petraeus.

Few men wouldn’t have been tempted in his situation:
isolated from home and family, in a lonely, dangerous and unimaginably
stressful job, suddenly finding himself the subject of flattering attention
from a much younger woman. But he has paid the price demanded by a tradition of
censorious public morality that probably dates all the way back to the
puritanical Pilgrim Fathers.

About Me

I am a freelance journalist and columnist living in the Wairarapa region of New Zealand. In the presence of Greenies I like to boast that I walk to work each day - I've paced it out and it's about 15 metres. I write about all sorts of stuff: politics, the media, music, wine, films, cycling and anything else that piques my interest - even sport, though I admit I don't have the intuitive understanding of sport that most New Zealand males absorb as if by osmosis. I'm a former musician (bass and guitar) with a lifelong love of music that led me to write my book 'A Road Tour of American Song Titles: From Mendocino to Memphis', published by Bateman NZ in July 2016. I've been in journalism for more than 40 years and like many journalists I know a little bit about a lot of things and probably not enough about anything. I have never won any journalism awards.